Mechanical Engineer

Design, develop, and create machines.

Quick Stats

Salary Range

$51,000 – $119,000

Data from U.S. Department of Labor

What do Mechanical Engineers do?

A Mechanical Engineer focuses on the design of machines and ideas that produce higher efficiency, be this in the form of improving an existing design, or creating an original product. As a Mechanical Engineer you conceive and test such designs, calculate how the new products will perform, complete stress, function, and capacity tests, and carefully record data. In the end, your work goes towards improving how our machines work, which makes our industry and innovation move better and faster.

You have many options as a Mechanical Engineer in how to use your hard-earned skills. If you like machines and love to tinker with new ideas, you could design new equipment. After all, every appliance, tool, and vehicle known to man started as nothing more than an idea. Another option is to tweak an existing model to improve its efficiency or add more features. Take the household dishwasher, for example. You create designs that use less energy, shorten the required wash cycle, or run on a renewable resource.

In addition to airplanes, cars, trains, pumps, turbines, and appliances, you also work with none-motor related products and ideas; a ventilation system for a huge building, for example. In this type of position, you research ducting materials, analyze the capacity of the building design, and formulate a plan for the instillation that will provide equal heat and cooling benefits to each portion of the building.

With all these options, you can work to design a dune buggy for use on the moon, or a self-motorized clamp used during intricate surgeries. Regardless of your specific projects, you will need your attention to detail, flair for invention, and creativity to enhance the products the rest of us use every day.

Should I be a Mechanical Engineer?

You should have
a
bachelor's
degree or higher and share these traits:

Ready for a Challenge:
You jump into new projects with initiative and drive.

Reliable:
You can always be counted on to do a good job.

Logical Thinker:
You take a step-by-step approach to analyze information and solve problems.